Hope they werent expecting a quick reply.

An Australian woman happened upon what experts believe is the oldest message in a bottle ever found, dating back to 1886.

Tonya Illman of Perth said she walking along the beach on Wedge Island in January when she spied the old glass bottle and picked it up. She thought the bottle which apparently once contained gin might look nice on display in her home, NPR reported, quoting from a website owned by her husband, Kym Illman.

Illman said when she got back to her car, she handed the bottle to her sons girlfriend, Bree Del Borrello. She noticed the bottle had no lid or cap, but there was something that looked like a cigarette inside.

It turned out to be a neatly rolled, damp note wrapped in string. After the paper dried, they discovered the note was written in German, according to the account on the website.

Using basic German language skills and Google Translate, Kym Illman figured out the person who dispatched the bottle wanted to know where and when it was found.

I could easily make out the day and month, June 12, but the year was harder to decipher, he said on the website. We had to wait a week before we had confirmation it was 1886.